This invention relates to trophy assemblies utilizing plastic columns sold by awards dealers and typically used to commemorate sports victories and other achievements.
Typical conventional trophy assemblies comprise a base, a lower lid, a column, an upper lid and a figure symbolic of the achievement. Larger trophy assemblies may comprise additional columns mounted to create multi-level trophies with the figure on the top with other decorative elements elsewhere in the assembly. Historically, trophies utilizing columns have been assembled using threaded rods that run through the base, the lower lid, the column, and the upper lid, and then attach to the figure using a coupler. A nut is then used to secure the base to the rod and compress the base, lower lid, column, upper lid, and figure together, thereby creating a rigid assembly.
The conventional threaded rod design has several disadvantages. One disadvantage is that the nut, threaded rod, and coupler (the “hardware”) contribute more than 30% of the number of components of a typical small trophy. This impacts the cost and weight of the final assembly, increases inventory and freight expenses, and requires substantial space for inventory. More importantly, assembling even the smallest of such trophies is a labor intensive process, typically requiring many discrete steps, including rotations and alignments of components. Accordingly, the average awards dealer must incur high labor costs, often necessitating the hiring of part time employees and payment for numerous overtime hours, to repeatedly complete this laborious process in order to have a sufficient number of awards ready in time for ceremonies during peak season. These disadvantages arise primarily from the structural design being based on threaded rods and compression for structural rigidity.
It is an object of the present invention to provide a trophy assembly requiring fewer components that can be assembled quickly and easily by using a column design that enables the column itself to become a structural element that holds the assembly together, thereby eliminating the need for the threaded rods and associated hardware. It is a further object of this invention to provide a trophy assembly that enables the columns, figures, platforms and lids of present invention to be combined with existing bases, figures and platforms in order to allow the use of existing inventories of figures, bases, and platforms with the structural column of the present invention. Finally, it is an object of the present invention to provide a trophy base, a trophy column, a trophy figure, a trophy platform, and trophy lids, suitable for use in the trophy assemblies of the present invention. Other objects and advantages of the present invention are made clear to those skilled in the art by the following description of the presently preferred embodiments thereof.